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Writing in Present Tense
Jun. 10th, 2009 04:30 pm"We find present tense often pretentious," said the submission guidelines of an admirable new webzine, "and second-person point-of-view always annoying." I gave it the Internet nod... yeah, true.
Uh, wait. Not quite. While my default writing mode is past tense, several of my stories are in present tense. Many of them didn't start that way; I wrote them in past tense, then converted them. And something about that conversion worked; it's true of a disproportionate number of the stories I've sold.
I think rewriting in present tense does three things to my stories:
1. Often, It makes it shorter, so it reads tighter. Partly, this is because contractions sound more natural in present tense. It doesn't shave off many words, but in flash fiction - one of my favorite forms - every word counts.
2. It makes it more immediate, as though we're walking along with the character as events unfold. My story- voice becomes less formal.
3. It makes it easier to switch between the "now" of the story, and flashbacks to an earlier time-period.
An example from my recently-published story, Lena:
In past tense, this becomes:
Oh, and on the matter of second person: I haven't written anything very much in second person. But only yesterday, I was reading a neat flash fiction story written as a "Choose your own adventure" - Hard Choices, by Tina Connolly, in Brain Harvest.
Uh, wait. Not quite. While my default writing mode is past tense, several of my stories are in present tense. Many of them didn't start that way; I wrote them in past tense, then converted them. And something about that conversion worked; it's true of a disproportionate number of the stories I've sold.
I think rewriting in present tense does three things to my stories:
1. Often, It makes it shorter, so it reads tighter. Partly, this is because contractions sound more natural in present tense. It doesn't shave off many words, but in flash fiction - one of my favorite forms - every word counts.
2. It makes it more immediate, as though we're walking along with the character as events unfold. My story- voice becomes less formal.
3. It makes it easier to switch between the "now" of the story, and flashbacks to an earlier time-period.
An example from my recently-published story, Lena:
At first, Rajan thinks he’s imagining her.
He’s a four-hour hike from the main gate of the nature sanctuary and not expecting to see anyone except perhaps an occasional villager illegally grazing his scrawny cattle. Certainly not a woman in an impractical silk sari...
He’s a four-hour hike from the main gate of the nature sanctuary and not expecting to see anyone except perhaps an occasional villager illegally grazing his scrawny cattle. Certainly not a woman in an impractical silk sari...
In past tense, this becomes:
At first, Rajan thought he was imagining her.
He was a four-hike from the main gate of the nature sanctuary, and was not expecting to see anyone except perhaps an occasional villager, illegally grazing his scrawny cattle. Certainly not a woman in an impractical silk sari...
To me, anyway, the story feels more distant in past tense. And that version has two extra words. If I needed to go into back-story, it would be simpler from first person.He was a four-hike from the main gate of the nature sanctuary, and was not expecting to see anyone except perhaps an occasional villager, illegally grazing his scrawny cattle. Certainly not a woman in an impractical silk sari...
Oh, and on the matter of second person: I haven't written anything very much in second person. But only yesterday, I was reading a neat flash fiction story written as a "Choose your own adventure" - Hard Choices, by Tina Connolly, in Brain Harvest.
